The Simple Pleasures of Philip Baker Hall

“I like simple pleasures, like butter in my ass and lollipops in my mouth.”

Had that been the only line Philip Baker Hall had ever spoken on screen, he’d be worthy of a legend. Of course, Hall did so much more than that over his fifty-year career, which began in 1970 with Antonioni’s Zabriskie Point, in which Hall was billed as “Diner owner.” But that line, from Paul Thomas Anderson’s classic treatise on the porn industry, Boogie Nights, delivered in Hall’s typical, no bullshit fashion has stuck in my mind like chewing gum on the bottom of my shoe on a 98-degree day. It’s perverse, foul even, but spoken in such a matter of fact way, that it’s not only hilarious and shocking, it manages to be both without seeming to try.

And that was the secret to Philip Baker Hall’s greatness: he didn’t seem to be trying. Whatever part he played, he just was. There was a remarkable economy in how he spoke his lines. He was flinty, sharp, and dead-pan, in ways that worked for both comedy and drama.

For many, Hall is probably most recognizable as the sort of library detective (appropriately named ‘Bookman’)who comes after Jerry in one of the many classic episodes of Seinfeld. One might think Hall was channeling Joe Friday in his staccato delivery of every word he spoke while d oggedly pursuing Jerry over a long overdue library book, but that was just Hall. That’s how he seemed to deliver every line in every scene he was in. I would never say he wasn’t “acting,” that would be insulting, because of course he was. But it never felt like it. When Philip Baker Hall was on screen, you just believed him. That was true if he was playing a porn financier trying to get Burt Reynolds’ Jack Horner to accept that the future of the industry is on videotape, or if he was trying to squeeze overdue book fees from Jerry Seinfeld.

Hall was one of those actors who, like Burgess Meredith, you could never imagine him being less than fifty years old. I swear, you’d be hard pressed to believe that he didn’t come out of the womb with half a century of life experience behind him on day one. Looking the way he did, with his sunken eyes, graying mane, and hang-dog expression, Hall didn’t have an easy road in the film business – no one was confusing him with Newman or Redford. His first decade and a half saw him toiling away as a guest actor on episodic television and bit parts on film. Then, and all credit due to Robert Altman for casting him, Hall caught his big break in the legendary director’s adaptation of the one-man play Secret Honor, in which Hall, for 90 minutes gives the performance of his life as a post-resignation Richard Nixon, holed up in his New Jersey mansion, railing against the dying of his political life. It is a true tour de force, and while it wasn’t widely seen during the year of its release (1984), over time it found a dogged cult following thanks to Hall’s remarkable vision of the 37th president of the United States.

That break didn’t lead to a succession of sizable roles in important movies, but it did put Hall on the map. Small parts in Midnight Run, and especially as an IRS agent in Say Anything who shows an unusual level of humanity to Ione Skye’s high school graduate trying to find out the truth about her father’s financial malfeasance, left strong impressions. 

Still, it would be twelve long years before Hall found another role that showcased the full range of his skill. In 1996, just one year before “butter and lollipops,” Paul Thomas Anderson cast Hall as the lead in his first film, Hard Eight (or Sidney, if you ask PTA), as a professional gambler who takes pity on a “born to” loser (a brilliant John C. Reilly), who he makes a partner of, and then commits an act of violence to save him, only to end up all alone in a diner, covering his bloodstained shirt sleeve with the long arm of his jacket. It’s a stunning debut by Anderson, and it’s carried – almost completely – by a man in his mid-sixties with exactly one previous lead role to his credit on film. And you could not possibly imagine the film in any other way.

After Hard Eight, Hall had a wonderful stretch of performances in films widely seen and well respected. Air Force One, Boogie Nights, The Truman Show, Enemy of the State and Cradle Will Rock followed. In 1999, Hall capped the end of the century by being in two of the finest films from that seminal year in film – as 60 Minutes exec Don Hewitt in Michael Mann’s brilliant The Insider, and as Jimmy Gator for (once again) Paul Thomas Anderson in Magnolia. 

The remainder of Hall’s career followed suit. He seldom had large parts, but he made the most out of every one of them. He kept so busy that he could be seen in two movies about the Zodiac Killer, David Fincher’s 2005 masterpiece Zodiac, and 2007’s decidedly less masterful The Zodiac, starring one of the guys who played a doctor on Grey’s Anatomy. 

Hall was the epitome of a “working actor.” One of those thesps like JT Walsh or Robert Forster who, as soon as they appeared in front of your eyes, simply made whatever you were watching better. The kind of actor that you could take for granted if you didn’t know better than to do so. 

But many of us knew better, yes we did. When Philip Baker Hall was on screen, we straightened up and leaned forward, just to catch a glimpse of the often all too brief magic he would deliver to us. It’s fair to say that he never let us down.

Philip Baker Hall died yesterday. He was 90 years old.